I was raised on the prairie part of southwestern Minnesota and it was a delightful surprise when I moved 140 miles east to find that one could gather almost any desired quantity of black walnuts from remnants of the old forest. After a few years these trips to the woods became less glamourous and the pickeruppers more critical. Many of the wild nuts were small and hard to crack. Perhaps a friend's Thomas tree in full bearing with its heavy crop of huge, tasty nuts inspired a wish to grow bigger and better producing trees near at home. It looked easy to transplant vigorous, 6 foot black walnut whips which could be had for the digging. It took 10 years to learn that nuts properly planted would make larger trees in a decade than transplants. Digging 2 deep holes to move one tree seemed a waste of labor when one planted nut would better serve the purpose. Of course nut planting led to a contest of wits with the squirrels. It was a funny sight to watch a helper carefully placing nuts at regular intervals in an open furrow and a big fox squirrel following 10 feet behind him, removing the prizes as fast as he could scamper up and down a nearby hollow oak. Our ideas concerning appropriate locations for walnut trees did not coincide with those of Mr. Bushytail. We learned that the simple way to plant walnuts in the woods was to pile a half a bushel here and there. The tree climbers took their toll, but did a good job of planting. Survival seemed better than when we placed individual nuts and "stepped them in." The desire for bigger, better and more useful nuts led to the planting of a couple of acres to seed from various trees of known value. These will not come true of course but it is hoped that some day they may serve as material for a small nut breeding project in which an attempt will be made to combine some of the more desirable chromosomes into a single tree that retains the best of what we have in present selections, and adds a little more hardiness between growing seasons. Who can tell? We might find a tree that the walnut worms didn't like! The squirrels didn't fancy our plans to grow trees in rows according to parentage, so they tried to improve our technique. We almost called in the F. B. I. to circumvent their machinations. Jamming an open tin can over the planted nut seemed to help. When the sprout came up we turned up the edges of the split can bottom just enough to let the tree through, but the sharp jagged edges seemed to discourage marauders. A lot of other methods were also tried.